


"Monsieur, why are you so close to the edge?"

by thepeopletoomustrise



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Gen, I Tried, M/M, TW: references to suicide, les mis kink meme
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-18
Updated: 2013-03-18
Packaged: 2017-12-05 18:34:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/726512
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thepeopletoomustrise/pseuds/thepeopletoomustrise
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Wondering where Valjean has gone, Cosette goes in search of her father and encounters Javert on the bridge."</p>
            </blockquote>





	"Monsieur, why are you so close to the edge?"

**Author's Note:**

> Cosette finds Javert on the bridge and is confused as to why he's standing so close to the edge. 
> 
> Fill for the LM Kink prompt on pg. 37. 
> 
> I don't usually write such serious things, but it was honestly too emotionally ravishing for me to pass up. 
> 
> (PS- I kind of blended the Brick and movie!verse. Bare with me? I don't really know how Cosette know where to go, but she just does ok)  
> (PS PS- TW for mentions of suicide.)

Cosette had always liked water, and she thought the Seine was rather relaxing. And relaxing was what she needed when she had no idea where her father was located.

She liked to watch the water swirl, to catch on rocks and slosh along the sides of the river; to watch the oblivions of blue lap over one another, playing some dizzying game of tag. She walked slowly, humming nervously and dragging her fingers along the railing of the Pont-au-Change. 

Her father had been gone for too long for her comfort, so she had gotten a carriage to take her to places she remembered him talking about wanting to see; this bridge being one of them. Maybe he had just gone for a visit. 

But there was no sign of him. Not yet. 

Cosette sighed. She was worried; there was no doubt of that. But part of her took solitude in the fact that her father surely would not have lied to her; he said he’d be gone the night, and that was all. Maybe she was overreacting. 

Either way, a little fresh air couldn’t help, could it? The river would help her make sense of her thoughts, anyway. 

It was then when she caught the vision of a figure in the corner of her eyes. He was up the bridge twenty or so feet, and she blinked, fixating her eyes on the shadow in the dark of the night. The man wasn’t standing on the bridge, though; not like she was. He was standing on the edge of the bridge, dangerously close to the point where the stone disappeared and where his feet would surely be met by oblivion. 

\------

“Cosette, be careful, now,” Jean Valjean had said years ago, tipping his hat as he reached for his daughter’s hand. “You mustn’t get too close to the edge, it’s very dangerous.” 

“Papa, how I would love to go for a swim!” the child’s eyes twinkled, and Jean Valjean laughed. 

“Then we will go, soon. But there are dangerous parts of this river. It swallows things up whole.” 

“Up whole? Like a monster?”

“Yes, Cosette; like a monster.” 

\------

“Monsieur!” she called out to the figure, and she picked up her pace. Her soft shoes scraped against the stone in a rather unpleasant fashion. There was a pause as the figure shifted. She approached carefully, repeating herself. “Monsieur!” 

“What are you doing out here at this time of night?” when the figure finally spoke, his voice was a gruff one; deep and dark and crackling with shards of a distraught tone. 

Cosette adjusted the shawl she wore, and looked at him closely, “I’m looking for someone.” 

“Well, go along now. The streets are not safe at night,” he prompted, and she could see him turn towards the river again. Something about his tone made her nervous, though; it was unsettling, lacking any sort of closure. She bit her lip, and instead of turning away, she looked back at the man, and her eyes traced the line of a uniform. 

“Monsieur, are you in the Police?” he turned to look at her again, and she could make out more of his face, one ridden with lines of worry. She gestured towards his uniform. 

There was a pause, and then a nod, “I am an Inspector.” 

“I see,” she said, and she crossed her arms, looking out into the sky that seemed especially black that night. “Pardon my intrusiveness, but…” she looked back at him, surprised at her own valiance in talking to such authority. Her father did not like authority figures, generally speaking, “… but why are you so close to the edge?” 

He looked tired of her words when he flatly said, “Were you not looking for someone?” 

“I…” she chewed on her lip. Her father would not be enthralled to hear that she was talking to shadowy Inspectors on a bridge so late at night. “Well, yes. But, monsieur, I am worried about how close your feet are to the edge. It’s a far drop, you know.” 

“I’m aware,” he affirmed, turning away from the girl. 

But even as he seemed to give her the cold shoulder, she couldn’t help but to want to know more. This man was mysterious, and she was lonely. Beside, he looked sad. Maybe she could spread some sunshine amongst such a starless sky.

“My father told me that it engulfs things,” said Cosette plaintively, and after hesitation, she leaned to sit on the thick edge, next to where the Inspector stood. She looked at his shoes, which reflected the light of the moon. “It’s my father I am looking for, actually.” 

The Inspector said nothing in reply. 

“I would like to make a friend tonight, if that is alright with you. And it seems as though you could use a friend, too. Therefore we are friends, now,” she added, and she held a piece of blonde hair in her hand, twirling it between fingers. She didn’t even know if the Inspector was listening at this point, but it felt good to talk. “How did you end up around here?” 

Much to her alarm, the man did reply- sternly, but it was still a reply, “I came from the barricades.”

“Oh, my!” Cosette gasped, looking at him with fear. “Were there many casualties?” 

“This is not something a young lady should hear,” he said softly, and she heard the toe of his boot scrape along the edge. 

“Why are you on this bridge, then? You must be quite exhausted,” 

The Inspector paused, and she watched as he looked out somewhere into the distance, searching for something in the sky. She thought she saw one of his eyes shimmer, but she blinked and it was gone. 

“I’m unhappy.” 

“Unhappy?” she blinked up at him in confusion. Young Cosette had never been exposed to the idea of suicide before, and so nothing rung a bell in her mind. “Why don’t you go home?”

“I do not have a home,” the man said, and he turned away to look the other way; she heard him sigh dejectedly. 

“Oh, everyone has a home, monsieur! I, for one, have had many physical homes; but only through traveling did I learn that my home lies within my father! Both physical and spiritual, of course,” she watched him, and she spoke with gentle words. “Or maybe your home is not within a person, but within a purpose. Tell me, what do you devote yourself to more than anything else?” 

The man paused, and she waited with evident patience. 

“The Law.”

“Well, there, then! Find happiness in that, in your purpose!” 

The man turned back to this peculiar young woman who seemed to insist of having this conversation. He didn’t necessarily want to reply, but if she was so furiously insisting to talk, he could not shoo her off. “You see, mademoiselle, the problem lies within my purpose. I serve the Lord.”

“As do we all.” 

He shook his head, intent, for some odd reason, on making her understand his predicament. “You do not understand; the Lord enforces the Law, of course. But the Lord enforces light; and mercy...” 

“That is true,” she mused, watching the man’s feet again. She heard the water rush beneath them as it parted along the rapids. 

“I have found a contradiction between the two,” he sighed, and she heard the crack in his voice she heard when she first called to him. “I have found that it is possible to act lawfully while immorally, and vice versa. I cannot allow myself to mock the law; the thing I have been protecting for years.”

“Mmm…” Cosette wasn’t really sure how to reply to this man’s seemingly large sense of self-defeat, but she certainly wasn’t done talking to him. “You remind me of my father,” she said softly. The man looked at her. “And when my father is sad, I tell him to remember all of the beauties in life. I remind him of the sunset, of the leaves, of the patterns in the pavement or the beauty of the stars. Conflict is everywhere; it is frightening, it is imminent. It’s inescapable, really, but Inspector, surely it can be overcome.” 

The older man looked down at her with a broken smile that curled downwards at the edges, “I’m not sure this can be overcome, mademoiselle.” 

“Sure it can! Why, my father has a rougher past -- that he avoids telling me about at all costs – but that’s beside the point. The point is that he overcame it, whatever it was, and is now such a valiant man, Inspector! A good man, a loving man… regardless of what the past had done to him! Turning around surely cannot be as hard as it appears!” she smiled up at him, encouraging. Wind whipped at the man’s coat. 

“I wish I could hold such optimism and youth as you. But I cannot. The time is long past for me, I regret to say,” he took a few strides away from her, and she frowned. “It has been a pleasure, but you should move along, now.”

“Wait!” she got up carefully, brushing her dress off before following him. “I don’t have many friends.”

Silence was his reply for a moment. 

“Neither do I.”

She clasped her hands together, grinning, “Perfect! We are friends now, are we not? I may be just a young girl in your eyes, but I assure you that I strike quite fantastic conversation. How about you visit with my father and I for dinner tomorrow night? He would be delighted to meet you! You are rather fascinating!” The Inspector couldn’t look at her, and she prodded, “What is your name, anyway?”

The Inspector stared into the distance, and he searched for stars that were not visible in the dark and murky night sky. “I’m Javert,” his voice was a whisper, and it trembled softly into the night air. _Would it be the last time he said it?_

“That’s a fine name, Inspector Javert!” she said, nodding. 

He didn’t say anything in reply. He faced away from the girl with the voice of a butterfly, and tears glimmered in his eyes. The innocent young woman had no idea of why he was on the bridge; of how his heart had felt as if it was hammered and shattered and how his brain was battling itself with his own thoughts. She wanted a friend. _A friend._

“Well,” she said quietly, looking into the sky, following his gaze. “You could help me find my father, if you’d like. Maybe that would help you feel not so sad anymore. You’re an inspector after all.” 

Javert thought long and hard about the option. He was, in all honesty, ready to be done. He did not know how to handle the civil war that was taking place in him, morality vs. the law, and his mind was reeling from the day’s events. 

But, Javert was for The Law. And it was part of his role to assist citizens such as this girl. He sucked in his breath and rapidly dragged his hand across his cheeks, wet with some sort of emotion. 

He would have to fill this last duty.

“Alright,” he stammered, and he turned around, taking a shaky step off of the bridge. “Just this last errand, and then I’m off duty.” 

Cosette was too busy grinning, “Ah, how thrilled my father will be to meet such a man as you! He would love to talk of the clash between injustice and immorality, I’m sure! And maybe your conundrum will be resolved! You will feel happiness soon, Inspector Javert, I am sure of it.” 

Javert nodded, but his words were doubt ridden. “I’m just doing my job.”

“Of course you are- you can have friends on your job, can’t you?” 

“Well.” 

Just this last mission, and then he’d return. No time for friends. 

The walked towards the base of the bridge, and he straightened his jacket. “Mademoiselle,” he said, “what is your name?” 

“I’m called Cosette.” 

_Cosette._

**Author's Note:**

> OKAY SO, that was that. Ah, I hope it was okay. It made me emotional, but then again, chocolate cake makes me emotional.
> 
> Feedback is really appreciated! Thank you, lovely fandom!


End file.
